Day 17…
We got up so early this morning to leave at 530 am to catch the tube to the train to the airport… And yet somehow I was wide awake!!!
When we got to the airport it was a slightly hectic scene because we had to not only check in, wait for the gate to be posted, go through security, then go through a second security or something, and then when I handed them my boarding pass, it was like another security check. Fortunately I was not patted down for like the first time in the last year. I don’t think I look like a security risk but hey, maybe I do?
When we go onto the plane I was so excited I could barely take it! I basically fell asleep before we took off and woke up 20 minutes before we landed, my way of making time go by quicker, and it seemed to me like those seats were extremely comfortable. But when I woke up, I looked out the window and just couldn’t stop smiling in awe! The land is so green and the houses so cute. I looked down and a river is going through town, many bridges are going over it, and very few large buildings are surrounding the area. Perfect J
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| Our Hotel in Belfast, Ireland |
When we got off the plane we went got on to the bus and he drove us to our hotel. The Hilton Hotel in Belfast, Ireland is amazing! We weren’t able to check in yet because the rooms weren’t ready but they did allow us to store our bags in their office type room. We were meeting the bus back around 1 so we had a few hours where we could look around and get some food.
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| St. George's Farmer's Market |
Everyone went to the St Georges market place, which is one of the oldest markets in Ireland (I think they said world but I’m not sure?)It had so much food choices for lunch and dessert, and smoothies to drink. I of course am picky and didn’t get anything, but everyone that did had amazing looking food. Quite a few people got crepes and they smelt and looked so yummy and a few people ate paninis which also looked pretty good minus the meet.
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The new, soon to be complete
Titanic Memorial building |
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Graffiti Wall along an entire street
Belfast, Ireland |
Our tour of Belfast started at 2. I was so excited I was the first on the bus, and sat in the front seat! Our tour guide, Maria, Showed us around town. Sadly we were on a bus for a lot of my pictures, so they had some reflection once and a while. But she showed us the Court house, old jail, the wall between the two sections of the city which had murals on it and a wall of names where people just wrote on it and kept adding. She also talked to us about the Titanic. Apparently the Titanic was built in Belfast, and until you see where it was built you really don’t appreciate the size of it. There is a new building going up for the centennial of when it set sail which is April of 2012. I feel like I learned more about the Titanic and where it came from then the movie, because with the movie I just remember the story of Jack and Rose.
When we got into our hotel room Maddie and I (Maddie is my roommate in Ireland) took tons of pictures of everything, from the shower in the bathroom, to the chair in the corner, everything looked so nice and comfortable!
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Yellow Gazebo thing
outside the Victoria Mall |
Tonight our plan was to go to a pub and listen to Irish music. Now nothing started till 9 or so, and of course we were hungry at 6... so we went shopping to try and pass time a little quicker. The Victoria Mall has one of the most amazing cores I have ever seen. The glass ceiling, open central interiors, glass elevator, staircases and escalators going up in different places, along with the cool breeze blowing through it made it the mall of my dreams, and that’s not even going into the stores yet. Surprisingly I didn’t buy anything that day; I just wanted the Ireland feel and experience.
Dinner was fantastic. While waiting in front of The Kitchen Bar (pub we decided to go to) there were multiple drunken people out front just drinking away. And because a few of the people had large cameras, people from Ireland thought they were news reporters, both kids and grown adults were asking if they could have their picture taken. I think it scared a few of the girls I was with, but I thought it was great. J The food was surprisingly well proportioned and we all for once got full, and then we had dessert to top it off. Irish people make their food look so good, and the plates beautiful.
Everyone just ended up going back to the hotel after dinner. Everyone looked so tired, but I was so ecstatically excited I couldn’t have even tried to sleep. I went into one of the rooms next to me and just hung out… Surprisingly enough, I can do girl talk while I’m in Ireland, but nowhere else for sure!
~Sweet Dreams~
Elyse
I went off with Stacy and Maddie to the Victoria mall. The stores here in Ireland have way cuter clothes then any store in Utah… Fortunately I controlled my urge to spend tons of money and didn’t buy any clothing that wasn’t obviously Irish, although, I did try on a lot of different cute outfits in hopes I would find something. The dressing rooms of most of these stores and shops were so wonderfully decorated, with beautiful wall paper, great lighting(chandeliers even), cute colors; it was possibly some of my favorite store, but I was set out and determined to find a souvenir shop!
After shopping through quite a few stores, and Maddie buying a lot of new cute clothes, we finally went to a souvenir shop, where I spent over an hour picking out all my gifts for everyone, including myself!!! It was like my version of heaven, St. Patrick’s Day stuff and Irish stuff EVERYWHERE!!! I’m still shocked I found almost everything I wanted to get in one store!!! But of course for those things I couldn’t find, I went on a mission to find! Belfast, Ireland is known for Linen among other things, so I found it only necessary to go into a linen shop where I found this super cute bag that I just had to have J then went to another store to get my final items (I’m not mentioning what they are in case I got you something.) 
The view from outside any of these little shops is amazing. You can see the rolling hills that surround the city right from the door steps. It is definitely a dream of mine to live in Ireland. Even more now than ever!
